


And We Get To Do It All Again Next Month

by dinolaur



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Domestic Pack, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-23
Updated: 2012-11-23
Packaged: 2017-11-19 07:53:05
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/570924
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dinolaur/pseuds/dinolaur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When you have thirteen people, six of whom are werewolves, as your guests for Thanksgiving, it might be time to start buying the turkey pre-made.</p>
            </blockquote>





	And We Get To Do It All Again Next Month

**Author's Note:**

> This is because of Melissa Ponzio's tweet about her still frozen turkey. It's all her fault.

The first year it happens, it’s because his wife is too sick to go through all the strenuous Thanksgiving cooking. John would do it, he would, but he sort of burns cereal, and when he’d tried to make a grocery list, Stiles had just made a face, patted his arm, and told him to go watch the game.

They’re prepared to just all sit on the couch with peanut butter and jelly sandwiches when Scott calls to excitedly invite them all over to share in their food. He says that his dad had to go out of town unexpectedly, and they just have too much to eat even with his grandparents there. The Stilinskis go home with enough leftovers to last them a week. By the end of it, Stiles swears he’s never eating potatoes again.

He changes his mind quickly when his mother reminds him that’s what curly fries are made from.

The next year, Melissa calls them over for Thanksgiving again. His wife has been dead for almost half a year, and the hole that she’s left behind is still threatening to swallow both him and his son whole. He wants to decline the offer, even tries, but Melissa is nothing if not persistent. She insists and refuses to take no for an answer. It’s a little more awkward that year. Her husband obviously doesn’t want them there, and Stiles is still so quiet. They go home with a little less leftovers, and the door has hardly closed behind them before Melissa’s husband is complaining about how long are they going to keep giving the Stilinskis handouts.

The next year, Melissa is separated from her husband, waiting on the divorce papers. That year, it’s John who calls her to come over. The meal is less spectacular. Stiles is on his way to becoming a pretty adventurous cook, but Thanksgiving is a hell of an undertaking. John tries to help, but he somehow manages to make the cornbread dressing explode in the oven. Thank God they’d already done the turkey.

John is elected sheriff the following year, and he’s on shift Thanksgiving night. Melissa offers to take Stiles in for the day, and John joins up with them the next afternoon for lunch with the leftovers. The boys want to go out to get their hands on the Black Friday sales, and Melissa laughs when John pales.

The next year is a bit of a mess. Melissa and John are both worried about their sons’ behavior. They’ve been acting weird and secretive. And, yeah, they’re sixteen, and maybe that’s normal. Maybe. But they’ve also been showing up at far too many of John’s crime scenes, and that’s just troublesome. They’re hardly involved in the meal at all. They show up late, eat, and run out, leaving all the clean up with John and Melissa, who is livid, because she had to use up almost all her favors to get the day off.

The next year, which John refers to in his head as “the year that things finally started make sense after the year of insanity”, Thanksgiving is less of a prepared meal and more of a just heating up whatever happens to be in the house. With a pack of Alphas terrorizing the area and the manhunt still going on for Gerard Argent, well, as Erica puts it, “Ain’t nobody got time for that Thanksgiving shit.”  

The kids’ senior year, after two years of utter hell, is uneventful in the way of the supernatural, and that is an absolute miracle. John and Melissa are kind of always waiting for the other shoe to drop, because after everything that’s happened since Scott was bit, it just seems like it’s too good to be true that things have calmed down. Stiles explains that after beating back the Alphas and taking down Gerard the Hale Pack is being view as a real and viable threat, not something to be trifled with. It’s crazy to think that that is in no small part thanks to their sons.

So, with no threat of imminent death looming over their heads, John and Melissa tell their boys to pass on that the rest of the pack is welcome to join them all for Thanksgiving. Stiles grumbles that they don’t know what they’re getting themselves into.

And he’s so totally right.

John is close to appalled when he sees Stiles unloading their portion of the groceries. “You’re hosting six werewolves and three human teenagers. What were you expecting,” Stiles asks when John gapes at the receipt and wonders if he's going to be able to pay the water bill next month.

The next morning, everyone arrives early. Allison and her dad come in with enough pies to fill a bakery, and Allison then proceeds to spend the next hour standing guard in front of them with a loaded crossbow. John thinks that’s overkill, but Erica and Isaac do try to stage a heist while Boyd attempts a distraction. It ends with an arrow stuck through the back of a chair and Stiles bellowing that the kids are all grounded.

“But I didn’t do anything,” Jackson complains as Lydia throws them outside.

“There’s apple filling on your cheek, dummy,” she says, slamming the door in his face.

From the counter, Melissa pokes at the massive turkey. It’s a beast of a thing. John’s pretty sure it would take about three normal people to have carried it in. Boyd had been proud of it, stating that he had waged epic battle to win it from an old lady.

John thinks that’s a little drastic, and really, he could have just grabbed a couple of them, but Peter Hale cackles in delight, and Boyd seems simultaneously creeped out but also pleased.

“This turkey is still frozen,” Melissa comments.

Stiles sticks his head out the window and bellows, “BOYD, DID YOU LEAVE THE TURKEY OUT OVER NIGHT?”

“OF COURSE I DID. I'M NOT STUPID,” is the responding yell.

“IT’S STILL A FREAKING ROCK,” Stiles complains.

“WHAT DO YOU WANT ME TO DO ABOUT IT?”

“SUFFER IN THE KNOWLEDGE THAT I’M DISAPPOINTED.”

“The ridiculous thing,” Lydia comments as she stirs the chicken stock, “he is going to feel bad that Mommy’s upset.”

John tries to decide if he should be more concerned about the neighbors complaining about the noise or that a pack of werewolves refer to his son as their mom.

The turkey panic doesn’t actually set in until about an hour later. The beast of a bird still hasn’t thawed, and they’re cutting it close. The thing needs several hours in the oven, and the werewolves are already poking their heads in to ask if food is ready yet. Stiles and Allison make panicked faces at each other as they stand over the three hams. “This isn’t enough meat,” Allison says.

“No way we’ll be able to get anything to replace the turkey,” Stiles grumbles, glaring at the bird.

“Should we let them loose in the woods,” Allison asks.

“I am not sitting at a Thanksgiving dinner table next to werewolves with rabbit blood on their shirts,” Lydia huffs.

“Um, how about we aren’t eating wild caught rabbit,” Melissa comments.

“So, are we breaking into a pet store then,” Peter asks gleefully, and Stiles throws him out of the kitchen by his ear.

It’s DEFCON 1 when the afternoon games start up and the damned thing still hasn’t thawed. “Maybe they won’t notice,” John tries. Stiles actually throws the spoon he was using to stir the gravy at him. The werewolves have all come back inside, and everyone is shouting over each other about what can be used instead. Erica and Isaac are in a screaming argument about whether or not baked chicken is appropriate on Thanksgiving. Isaac says no, and Erica doesn’t care, she’s just hungry now, and she promises she’ll eat his face if someone doesn’t come up with a solution.

Stiles, apparently, has had enough. He yells, “You know what, screw this! We’re just going to eat what we have. Is that okay with everyone who hasn’t lifted a finger to so much as peel an egg or wash some dishes like I asked three hours ago, _Derek_. And don’t give me that look. I don’t give a damn if you’re the Alpha. You can be the Alpha that washes the dishes when he’s told.”

The look Derek gives Stiles is murderous, but he still slinks over to the sink and starts scrubbing.

“As for the turkey, if the stupid thing is done doing it’s Captain America impression—“ John doesn’t get that reference, but Scott lets out a shrill giggle. “—I’ll cook it tomorrow for sandwiches.”

Things go a bit more smoothly after that, or, as smoothly as a Thanksgiving with thirteen people can. Derek washes as many dishes as he can, snapping for Jackson to make himself useful and dry them. Lydia has set the table, and it looks like something that belongs in a Martha Stewart catalogue. Melissa says as much, and Lydia just gives a bark of laughter and walks back into the kitchen with a toss of her long hair. Chris is following Peter around, trying to slap his hands away from whatever food is already laid out. Stiles has to separate them within five minutes.

God, his son really is all these people’s mother.

It’s something close to insanity, but they finally get all of the food cooked and ready to go. When everyone is seated, forks raised to dig in, Peter grins and asks if they’re going to be heathens and not say grace. Melissa offers him a cutting glare, and Lydia says, “Shut up, Peter.”

Scott’s face suddenly twists in that puppy dog expression, and he starts to say something really corny about the past two years and what a relief this one has been, but he’s cut off when Derek slaps the back of his head.

“Hey, goddammit, no fighting at the dinner table,” Stiles snaps, pointing his fork threateningly in their direction. John tries really hard not to laugh.

The day ends hours later with everyone draped over various surfaces in the living room. The Big Game is on, and while everyone is watching it, their various states of food coma are preventing much in the way of reaction. Except for Peter. He’s sort of violently into it.

John’s got a beer precariously balanced on his stomach as he lays slouched in his chair. He doesn’t really want to think about the utter disaster zone that is his kitchen, which Stiles will watch them all clean with utter sadistic delight after the game is over. He doesn’t want to think about how he’s on shift tomorrow. He’s still in a years long debate with himself about whether or not Black Friday or Halloween is the worst day of the year to be a cop.

It’s corny, so stupidly corny, but he just wants to think about the sentiment Scott was trying to get across before they ate. All of them are lucky to be here, to be alive to enjoy a single meal, let alone a massive production like Thanksgiving. He’s thankful that, for all the trouble it gets him in, that if his son has to be involved in all of this supernatural stuff, that it’s with this pack. Because even though these kids spent two years getting the short end of every single stick, whatever they all have when they team up, it works, and it’s kept his son and his friends and the whole damned town alive.

He wishes Stiles’s mother was alive to see what their boy has become. She’d be so proud.

Although, she might have a couple of complaints that Stiles and Scott dressed up the still frozen turkey in one of her old Stanford shirts and a Santa hat and have it next to them on the couch while they watch the game. 


End file.
